Easter 2011
by r4ven3
Summary: I wanted to write an Easter story, and this is as close as I'll get. It is set Easter 2011 (thus the title ...) and Ruth has chosen to work on the Grid for the whole 4 days. Why not? It's not as though she has anything better to do. 2 chapters of (not terribly original) HR fluff.
1. Chapter 1

**_A/N: I'm definitely repeating myself in this 2-shot, but I still thought it worth writing._**

**_I may have messed with the time line a bit in order to make everything fit where I wanted it to. Characters belong to Kudos._**

* * *

"That address rings a bell," Tariq says aloud, but to himself.

Ruth is two desks away, and so she has no idea what address he's talking about, but if he wants to share the information with her, she knows he will. She is speed reading the day's terror threats ... the usual smorgasbord of mayhem and madness. It is her job to create ordered threat assessments, which would normally be passed on to Erin – the interim Section Head.

Erin is one of the reasons Ruth will be relieved when Harry returns - if he returns - but to think too hard about the possibility Harry may never return to the Grid is to invite dark thoughts about what a Harryless life might be like.

Easter Sunday night is a graveyard shift, and Ruth almost always volunteers, along with Good Friday, Easter Saturday, and Easter Monday. What else is she to do? With everyone under the age of forty taking the four days off to spend with friends and family – other than Tariq, who appears to have no life outside MI-5 – that leaves Ruth holding the fort. Last year, Ruth had only worked Good Friday, since Easter had fallen soon after Ros' funeral, and Harry's strange, and desperate proposal, and she'd not fancied being cloistered with him – almost alone – during the four day weekend. This year, he is on suspension for committing treason - for handing over a genetic weapon (although not a real one, but that hardly seems to matter). Ruth considers her working the four days of the Easter break to be her own particular penance for Harry's temporary madness. After all, he'd given away Albany because he loves her, so in her estimation, that must mean she's partly responsible.

"Number 61 Clifton Street -"

"What?"

"Number 61 -"

"I heard you the first time, Tariq."

"So -"

"That's Harry's house. What is it? Gas leak? Break in?"

"I've only just noticed it."

"If it was flagged, it should have come up straight away."

"It did, but all it says is …..."

"_What_?" Ruth almost shouts, and Tariq's eyebrows move together as he frowns, leaving his eyes like large brown dinner plates.

"All it says is that the security system is down."

Ruth grabs her desk phone, and punches in Harry's mobile number. There's a possibility his electricity is off, and so his cordless home phone may not be working. His mobile phone goes straight to voicemail.

"Harry," she says abruptly, "ring me to let me know you're alright."

"He may have turned it off himself," Tariq offers, watching Ruth warily.

"And why would he do that?"

Tariq shrugs, and it is then that Ruth understands Harry's hatred of the shrug, and his demanding it should never be used as a method of communication between colleagues in the workplace. At that moment, when Ruth is experiencing more than a mild level of concern for Harry's safety, she has to breathe deeply in order to not raise her voice when speaking to Tariq.

"When did the security system go down?" she asks, as calmly as she can manage.

"8.27 pm."

"8.27? That's almost two hours ago. What _took_ you so long?"

"I was prioritising, and Ruth …... although the address was flagged, I hadn't known it was Harry's place. A security system going down at a flagged address is not top priority." Not until now, apparently.

"Ring downstairs, and get me a car, Tariq."

"I already have. There are none available, but door security has rung for a taxi."

Ruth had been so distracted by this occurrence at Harry's house that she hadn't noticed Tariq acting on the information.

"Perhaps I should call Internal Affairs," he adds.

"Why?"

"They have people watching Harry's house."

"Not after 10 pm."

"You don't know that."

"Actually, I do." Ruth shuffles around in her desk drawers for a couple of items she'd planned to take to Harry next time she happened to drop in with some soup or a casserole. Tonight there will be no meal for him, so she drops the two items into her bag, and then grabs her coat, and heads towards the door. She is just about to leave the Grid, eerily darkened by the lights being off in Harry's office, when she turns. "Oh, and Tariq ..."

"Yes?"

"Thanks for running those searches."

"It's my job, Ruth. It's part of what I do."

"I know, but …..." She manages a brief smile - a little forced, but still a smile. "Don't stay here too late."

"I thought I might sleep here tonight," he says, his face serious. "You never know what else I might find." Tariq hesitates for a moment, watching Ruth carefully. "Easter is not cause for celebration for Muslims, so ….. I may as well be here, and …... it could be a time when Islamic extremists choose to strike. You know, when no-one's paying attention."

"I know, Tariq. That's why I'm …..."

"Panicking?"

"Concerned. Thank you, Tariq, for all you do. I'll …... call you …... when I know what's going on. It's just that I have to know if …..."

"I know you do. He's …... we all miss Harry, Ruth."

Ruth nods, and turns back to the doors, surprised by the tears which have sprung to her eyes.

Tariq turns back to his monitor. He has been told (on more than one occasion) that relationship-wise, he is not a sensitive man, but even he can detect the tension between his boss and their senior analyst. He just wishes they'd deal with whatever-it-is sits between them, so that life on the Grid could go back to normal.

* * *

Sitting in the back of the taxi, Ruth is tense and nervous. She thinks the taxi driver is taking his time, even though she'd asked him to drive as fast as he could, but within the constraints of the law.

"The law don't limit me none, madam," he'd said, and that had been the end of their interaction.

Ruth decides to stare out the side window, because from that angle, she can imagine the taxi to be travelling very fast indeed. She'd asked the driver to drop her off just around the corner from Harry's house, so that she could enter his property through the back. She'd done it every time she'd visited him with food.

The first time she'd knocked at his back door carrying a container of soup, had been towards the end of his first week of suspension. He and she were not meant to communicate during his time away from the Grid, but she'd decided that if one was determined enough, ways would be found, and no-one need know. Harry had been surprised to see her, and she could also read in his eyes his pleasure that she had thought to visit him, and bring him some home-cooked food.

"I _can_ cook, you know, Ruth," he'd said, as she'd asked him where he kept the saucepans, so that she could heat the soup.

"I just thought it might be nice if …..."

He'd nodded and smiled, and she'd served their soup in bowls, and he'd toasted bread, and buttered it.

"Had I known you were bringing soup, I would have bought some crusty rolls," he'd said, smiling across the table at her.

Ruth had gone home soon after they'd finished eating, not wanting to over-stay her welcome. Harry had asked her to stay for a drink, and had looked rather lost when she'd used having to work next day as her excuse for not staying with him longer. She had visited him perhaps five or six more times since that evening, and each time had left soon after the meal.

As she squeezes between the small gap between Harry's back fence, and the neighbours' side fence, she remembers how each time she had gone home early, Harry had progressively begun to shut down. Each time she'd turned up with food for him, she had eaten with him – usually at his insistence – but when she'd refused to stay on and enjoy whatever hospitality he was offering her, his face had become a mask which hid his true feelings. Harry was very good at hiding what he felt, but Ruth could read the other signs, the signs that he was feeling helpless and rejected. He had a way of standing with his shoulders slumped, and his head down, his hands fiddling with whatever was close to him. He'd pretend to be occupied, but she knew he had no idea what to say to convince her to stay.

As she waits for him to answer the knock on his back door, Ruth hopes she is not too late to change the way she acts around him. It is clear to her how it is he feels about her. When she's being honest with herself, she admits that she feels the same way. It's just that she's been afraid – of what, she's not certain. She has never been terribly good at closely examining her fears. As Ruth sees it, looking too closely at what it is frightening her is like staring into the abyss.

Ruth places her face close to the kitchen window, and seeing nothing inside – no lights on, no movement of any kind – she does what any good spy would do. She picks the lock. She enters the house quickly and quietly, but before she has a chance to close and lock the door behind her, a sudden gust of wind catches it, and blows it shut with a bang.

"_Shit_," she says aloud, and then locks the door. If there's anyone in the house who shouldn't be there (apart form her, of course) then she's locked herself inside with them. She stands beside the kitchen sink for a moment, hoping to hear the sound of Harry moving around, turning on some lights, but there is nothing. Maybe he is out, and doesn't yet know about his security system being off.

Ruth places her bag on the kitchen table, and it is only as she is creeping down the hallway towards the living room door that she considers she should have at least taken her phone from her bag. A woman alone in a darkened house with a (possibly) unknown assailant is an easy target. She doesn't berate herself too much …... after all, she's not a field spy. She has just crept past the bottom of the stairs, when she hears a noise from above her. The creaking of floorboards under a man's weight in a silent house registers as loudly as a scream.

Ruth stands statue still, and slowly looks up towards the first landing, where she sees a figure wearing what looks like a flowing, dark red cloak. He is standing equally as still as she, holding a pistol, which is pointed directly at her head.

* * *

**_A/N: Final chapter up some time this weekend._**


	2. Chapter 2

_**A/N: 2nd and final chapter. Thanks to all readers, and also reviewers. Thank you for your interest and your predictions about what is going on. I hope you approve of where I take it, and why.**_

* * *

"_Jesus_, Ruth," Harry says, making no attempt to hide his irritation, "I could have taken your head off." Harry drops the arm which holds the pistol, and activates the safety catch. "Isn't it a bit late for dinner?"

"I ….. I …... didn't …..."

Ruth is still shaking, but there is an added distraction. Harry is dressed for bed – track pants and a t-shirt – his burgundy-coloured bathrobe hanging open. As she has been standing there, waiting for the shot to be fired, her eyes have become accustomed to the dark, and it is only now she can detect the outline and shape of Harry's body beneath his clothing. Of course, she knew the figure on the landing had been Harry, but she'd had to wait until he recognised her. That's what she is telling herself while she turns from his scrutiny of her, his face thunderous, and heads back towards the kitchen.

When Harry finds her, after having quickly tied his bathrobe, she is sitting at the kitchen table in the dark. This time, when he speaks, his voice is much softer.

"Ruth …..." he says, watching her as he slowly approaches the cooker, "I could have shot you and killed you. Why didn't you ring?"

"I did. Your phone went straight to voicemail." Ruth's voice is shaking, and she takes her hands and places them on her lap, under the table, where Harry can't see their trembling.

Harry reaches the cooker, and turns on the light above the cooker. The light is just bright enough for them to see around the room, and not so bright that it hurts their eyes. He then places the gun on the bench beside the cooker, and reaches into the pocket of his robe, and brings out his phone. He opens it, and tries waking it up.

"The battery seems to be dead. Sorry, Ruth. I haven't exactly been looking to be in touch with anyone these past few weeks."

He places the phone on the end of the table before again turning towards the bench, and turning on the kettle.

"I think a cup of tea is in order," he says.

"Have you …... anything stronger?" Ruth asks, looking up at him.

Harry turns to look into Ruth's eyes, and for the first time, sees her fear.

"What do you think?" he asks. "Is whiskey okay?"

Ruth nods, and so Harry quickly leaves the room to get a bottle and two glasses from the living room. Once Harry has poured them each a drink, they sit in silence for a few minutes, sipping their whiskey. Ruth finishes hers before Harry.

"Another?" she asks, and so he pours more amber liquid into her glass. "I'm not trying to get drunk," she explains. "I just need to settle my nerves."

"I'm sorry you were so shaken up, Ruth. Had I know it was you, I would have left the gun in the drawer upstairs. You still haven't said why you're here."

Ruth looks up suddenly, as if remembering something. "It's your security system. On Tariq's nightly scan, it showed up as deactivated."

Suddenly she grabs her bag from the end of the table, and digs around in it with her hand. Harry is watching all her movements, looking for signs that she is not as recovered as she wants him to believe.

"I have to ring Tariq," she says, struggling with her phone's lock screen.

Harry reaches across the table, and gently takes her phone from her hands. "I'll ring him, Ruth," he says. "I'll let him know that everything's alright. I turned it off myself …... just before _Downton Abbey_ started, so it must have been at around 8.30."

Harry gets through to Tariq after two rings, and while he explains the situation to the techie, Ruth holds Harry's eyes with her own, and mouths, `_Downton Abbey_?' Harry's phone conversation is over quickly, so he closes Ruth's phone, and places it back on the table between them.

"I never watch it, Ruth. I turn off the TV just before it begins."

_Likely story_, Ruth thinks. _He probably drools over Lady Mary Crawley ….. all that smouldering haughtiness_. "Why did you turn off your security system?" she asks.

"It seems to have developed a fault. The alarm goes off for no reason, even when the front door hasn't been opened. I plan getting someone in to look at it tomorrow. I'd only just gone to bed when I heard the back door bang."

"I'm sorry about that. I knocked, but …..."

Harry nods, and then he concentrates on his whiskey glass, which he slowly turns around between his fingers.

Meanwhile, Ruth finishes off her second whiskey, and then licks her lips. Good quality whiskey tastes so much better.

"I think I could do with a tea now, Harry."

* * *

They sit over their cups of tea, saying little. Harry is too afraid to speak, for fear she'll suddenly get up and go home, and Ruth wants to talk to Harry, but doesn't know where to begin.

Then she remembers the two items she'd put in her bag, just before she left the Grid.

"I brought a couple of things to give you," she says, reaching for her bag, and shuffling around inside it, feeling her way around the bottom of the bag. Smiling, she lifts out of her bag a foil-wrapped Easter egg, and a flash drive. "One of these is a gift from me to you, and the other has something on it I want you to look at for me. I need the opinion of …... someone I trust."

Harry takes both articles from her fingers, and looks across the table at her, his face relaxed at last in a smile.

"Thank you, Ruth, but I didn't get you anything."

"I didn't expect anything, Harry."

"That makes me feel even worse."

"I'm giving you the Easter egg because I want to, and I imagine no-one else would have given you one."

"There's no need to feel sorry for me, Ruth."

"I don't."

Harry sits in his chair, holding the chocolate egg in one hand, and the flash drive in the other. He uses all his self restraint to not stand up, walk around the table, and kiss her. He turns the egg around in his fingers.

Suddenly, he feels a knot of emotion crawling up from the pit of his stomach and into the back of his throat. It seems like years since anyone has thought to give him an Easter egg, and the simplicity of Ruth's gesture moves him in a way which surprises him. He gently places both items on the table, and then he stands up, and steps away from the table, turning to grab the teapot, which he'd left beside the cooker. He takes a deep breath …... and then another ….. and another.

"Harry, are you alright?"

Ruth is standing right behind him. He hadn't heard her move from her chair. He places both palms on the counter top, and takes another deep breath, letting it out slowly, and as he does, he feels Ruth's hand on his back, as she very softly massages her fingertips over the muscles of his back.

"Ruth, we could both lose our jobs if we get caught exchanging sensitive information while I'm on suspension."

"There is no coded message in the wrapper of the Easter egg, Harry."

He turns then, and faces her, his emotion having dissipated when she'd made the wry comment about the egg wrapper. He smiles into her eyes, happy that Ruth hasn't removed her hand, and that it is now resting on his waist. He leans forward, and very carefully slides his arms around her. He expects her to object – if not verbally, then with a sudden movement away from him. He holds her very gently, their bodies apart, while he waits for her to react.

"Besides, if you don't tell, then nor will I," Ruth says quietly. "I miss you at work, and I miss …. your expertise."

"I'm sorry I've made so little time for …... us, for …... this. The job just …... it consumes me."

"I know that, Harry. You have time now, though …... for this." Ruth moves just a fraction away from him, so that she can watch him. "I wasn't …... bringing you food because I thought you were in danger of starving."

He frowns slightly in confusion.

"The food was an excuse, Harry …... an excuse for me to see you. I've been …... wrong ….. to push you away like I have. I know that now."

He nods slightly, and his face relaxes, but he considers it is not yet time for celebration.

"Ruth …... I need you to know that ... every day I don't see you is an empty day."

They are awkward, he and she, and they struggle to say the simplest things …... but Harry has never in the eight years he has known Ruth declared his feelings for her as clearly as had right then. Even when he had (rather foolishly, it seems) asked her to marry him, he had not declared how he felt about her. He likes to imagine that he would have given away Albany to save any member of his team, and so that was perhaps not the grand gesture Ruth has believed it to be. He recognises the risk he has just taken, and with not a small degree of trepidation, he pulls back so that he can look at Ruth. She is gazing at him, her pupils dark, her lips slightly apart. If that isn't an invitation for him to kiss her, he doesn't know what is, but he waits.

"All I could think while I was on my way over here," she begins, still watching him with those large eyes, "was that you'd either been abducted, or murdered in your own house. I had to find out, Harry. I had to see if you were alright. What else could I have done?"

"Ruth," he says quietly, "tonight I could have killed you. I just …... can't get past that. I almost lost you before …..."

"Before what, Harry?"

He looks away from her for a moment, and sighs. "Before …..." He looks back at her, and her face is still an open invitation for a kiss, and perhaps more. "Before we were able to get past …... what it is has always kept us apart."

There. He'd said it. Almost. And he hopes Ruth understands his clumsy declaration of his intention, because if she doesn't …... if she doesn't understand what he is saying …...

As if in slow motion, Ruth steps closer to him so that she is pressing herself against him. He briefly closes his eyes, so that he can commit the moment to memory. Then he feels her hands find their way under his bathrobe, as she encircles his waist with her arms. He joins in the hug when he wraps his arms around her, and pulls her to him. He really wants to kiss her, but this is just as nice. They fit together. Their bodies curve and wind against one another – her breasts resting just above his belly, her face tucked into his neck.

They stand there, in his kitchen, with only the cooker light casting shadows, which slant across the table, and then climb a jagged path half way up the wall opposite. For the first time in years, Harry is happy. Again, he closes his eyes, and lays his cheek against Ruth's hair. She smells like the Grid …... and her shampoo …... and the air outside.

Inevitably, after a few minutes holding one another, their bodies close, Harry feels his own body respond, as he begins to swell against her stomach. He opens his eyes, and very slowly begins to pull away from her, hopefully before she feels what he is trying to hide. As he tries to pull away, her fingers press into the muscles either side of his spine, as Ruth holds him against her.

"Don't, Harry," she says against his neck.

"But -"

"You're a man and I'm a woman. It's healthy, and …..."

"And what?"

"And ..." Ruth pulls her face away from him, and looks up into his eyes, a small smile on her lips. "I'm glad. I'd been wondering ….."

"What had you been wondering, Ruth?"

"Whether you still could..." She smiles into his eyes as he lifts one eyebrow, and purses his lips. "... and if you could, whether you want me like that."

Harry can do no more than stare at her. _Want_ her? If only she knew how much he wants her.

"I don't want you to go home tonight, Ruth." _There. It's out in the open. Now it's up to her._

She gazes up at him, her eyes sparkling. "And I don't want to go home."

* * *

Harry tidies the kitchen while Ruth has a shower, so that by the time he enters his bedroom, she is under the duvet on the far side of the bed. They are about to spend the night together, and yet the last time they had kissed was more than five and a half years ago. Her eyes follow him as he unties his bathrobe, and then tosses it over a chair. He climbs into bed beside her, and lies on his side, his head on his pillow. It is well after midnight, and they have agreed to do no more than sleep together. Further intimacy will have to wait.

By unspoken agreement, they kiss gently, with just the barest hint of passion, before Harry pulls away, his eyes still on her face.

"I'd like to hold you while we sleep," Harry says.

Ruth nods, and turns on her side away from him, so that he can tuck his arm around her waist, curving his body around her.

"When we wake up, you know I'll be …... hard, Ruth. I need you to know that."

"If you're not, I'll be suing you for breach of promise."

He breathes out in a half laugh, relieved that Ruth is not prudish about how his body reacts to being this close to her.

* * *

When Ruth wakes, it is still dark, but she can feel Harry's erection pressing against her lower back, and she can tell from his breathing that he is awake. She gently pushes back with her buttocks, and he responds by burying his face in her neck, and kissing her skin again and again. When Ruth turns over to face him, she knows – they both know – that they are ready to take the next step.

Harry pulls away from her a little so that he can look at her. "That t-shirt looks better on you than it could possibly look on me," he says, before he kisses her.

It is a proper kiss, and as he feels Ruth's fingers touch the highly sensitive skin of his lower abdomen, where his t-shirt has ridden up from his track pants, he relaxes, enjoying the sensation of her fingertips lightly gliding over his skin, and then down his stomach towards the waistband of his pants. He smiles against her mouth. He can't help himself.

* * *

"I thought you'd changed your mind about coming into work today," Tariq says, watching Ruth as she settles herself at her desk. Tariq is busy at his work station. For all Ruth knows, he may have spent the night working.

"I had a late night and slept in," she says, sitting down at her desk, giving Tariq only a brief glance.

"How was Harry?"

"He was fine once he got over the shock of almost shooting me."

"And this morning? How was he then?"

_Oh, Tariq, you clever lad!_

"How should I know?"

Ruth may be lying doggo, but she doesn't fool Tariq. His last girlfriend had declared him useless at relationships. `You just don't read the signals,' she'd wailed, as she grabbed her clothes out of his closet, and stomped out of his life forever.

Okay, so he may be rubbish in his own relationships, but he can read the signals loud and clear in others', and he _knows_ – and would bet his house on it, if he had one – that Ruth had spent the night with Harry. It's the far-away look she gets when she thinks he's not looking, followed by the little smile which lifts the corners of her mouth. And it's just as well he's not a snitch. Besides, he likes Ruth, and he won't breathe what he knows to another soul.

It is _his_ secret …... his and Ruth's and Harry's.

_Fin_


End file.
